Aberrant
by Ignited
Summary: Sands muses on the cocky bastard that entered the CIA so many years before. Sequel to 'Productivity'
1. Darkness, a meeting, and lost valuables

Title: Aberrant (1/2)  
  
Author: Stef (ignitedangel@aol.com)  
  
Rating: R  
  
Summary: Sands muses on the cocky bastard that entered the CIA so many years before.  
  
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue  
  
Dedication: Thanks to Circe for motivating me to write this.  
  
Author's Note: A sequel of sorts to 'Productivity'. You really don't have to had read that in order to read this. Just going with a guess on Sands' age being 33 for dates here. Also, the drug is of my own invention, unless it exists and there's something we don't know about it. Ooh. Scary.  
  
When the elevator doors slide open, Sands has been standing very rigid. He feels his fingers grip the walking stick harder, a small grin, before he exits the elevator. The irony of the stick is not lost on him, though he chooses not to pull any more pranks for the night. Sure, maybe he had a little fun with that agent downstairs. Maybe the agent did choke to death. But could you honestly blame the debonair, ah, hell, let's just say it, good looking blind man sitting across from him?  
  
"Just an innocent citizen," Sands murmurs under his breath, counting numbers in his head. Nineteen steps, four to the right, and it is his suite. He fumbles in his pockets for his key, realizes that he doesn't have one. No, it's one of those credit card sort of things. So he jostles his pockets, fumbles with blind hands to unlock the door. It does.  
  
He nearly stumbles into the room, but at least he is inside. This is what he knows.  
  
Sands locks the door behind him, turning around again. He slips his jacket off, throwing the item of clothing onto the chair nearby. He has been here for around a week, but has memorized the layout of this room in half the time. It is required when one has gone through the excessive amount of training he has. Learn how to disassemble and reassemble weapons. Learn how to move around in the dark.  
  
Granted, this was eternal dark but somehow he'd deal with it.  
  
So for now he feels his fingers move, he feels his legs do the same, but is gloriously detached from it all. It is amusing how things work. People spoke, some in jest, some in pity, and Sands would either listen or tune them out. Without eyes, people did not know if he listened. He only chose to. In the darkness he knows he has turned on the radio. He knows he has made himself more comfortable, collar loosened.  
  
His body makes movements that his mind does not care for. Legs bring him to the window, and he can only tell it is night by the sounds of horns and humanity below.  
  
It is Broadway.  
  
Sands sighs. He takes one careful step back, turns his body to the right. Another step back, and his calves hits the low seat. Falling into it with a grunt, Sands fumbles in his pocket. Cell.cell. Did he leave it in his jacket?  
  
Yes. Yes, I did.  
  
He looks over at it with no eyes.  
  
"Ah, fuck it."  
  
He promptly falls asleep  
  
--  
  
It is night, and Sands has woken up. He drifts in and out, but is painfully aware of the sounds around him. One cannot tell if he is sleeping, other than the soft breathing, the random grunting. Legs sprawl, shirt twisted around his chest. His sunglasses have fallen off, and the first thing he wonders is if something has crawled into his eye sockets. It is a disturbing thought, though not surprising - it is New York City after all, and roaches do not ignore hotels.  
  
He doesn't want to find out.  
  
Sands bolts upward, shaking his head, messy strands of black hair falling this way and that.  
  
He considers the feeling of panic to be less immense than waking in the complete dark for the first time. Right after his eyes were fucking gouged out.  
  
But then, that dark? It wasn't the first time.  
  
--  
  
Ten Years Ago  
  
"You're gonna get us both fucking fired, man."  
  
"Oh, do shut up. Eight millimeter, strangulation, kidnapping.it's all you're ever good for. Don't add talking to the list."  
  
His partner - if one could call the young man seated nearby tapping his foot and squirming like he had the runs, a 'partner' - wasn't far off from the truth. Sheldon Sands wouldn't give his partner the satisfaction of a downward glance and admission of defeat. No. Of course not. That wasn't in the cards.  
  
More tapping his foot. Sands ponders what would happen if he shot a federal officer inside of the main building for the CIA.  
  
He knew it wouldn't be very good.  
  
So he turns the page of his reading material. Catwoman #3. Sands gently holds the right side and looks at it lengthwise, as if it were a pornographic magazine, admiring the view.  
  
"'Do what you can. Get in, find the info, get out'. Nowhere did he say 'kick a couple of security guards asses and have fun with some Molotovs'," the partner says. Sands had been paired up with him two weeks before. Two weeks, and he did nothing but annoy Sands. His name was Gregory.  
  
He keeps on tapping. Which is very annoying.  
  
"It's 'assi'."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Not 'asses'. 'Assi'," Sands points out. He is indifferent when Gregory raises his finger in response.  
  
The hallway is sparse: two chairs against the wall near a doorway. Gregory and Sands sit near each other. Not particularly busy; people would walk by once in a while. Someone with folders, someone running off. There is always movement.  
  
Sands crosses his arms, suit jacket twisting. The comic is clenched loosely in his hand. He wears his black suit slightly baggy, covering a rumpled white dress shirt underneath, a wrinkled black tie. It'd taken him a while to cobble it together. Hell, it'd taken him a while not to just say 'fuck it' and ditch the meeting. Nearly sprained himself falling out of the bed. Floors had to be so damn hard.  
  
His companion wears a suit, but the opposite style: clean cut, pressed and neat. Almost made you want to gag. Terrible, it was. Just terrible. Sands considered asking his sister in Miami to send over some extra t-shirts. But then that'd risk having Gregory moan about dress code and the like, and Sands couldn't have that.  
  
Lips purse for a moment, and Sands tilts his head back, looking at the ceiling. This is when the door near him opens, and a secretary beckons for the two men.  
  
Inside the office sunlight glares through yellow blinds, the room done in natural and artificial yellow, green, and blue hues. There is a big desk that occupies more than half of the space. It is a monstrous shape of metal, stubby feet and bare back. An imposing gentleman all done up in a crisp collar, pressed suit, years of work on his face and eyes sits behind it. He seems calm, but that state will fade within the next few minutes, Sands estimates, as he sinks into a seat. Gregory follows suit.  
  
He hears the man start into the usual CIA spiel. Covert, elite, and all that sort of junk. Sands understands the message, but doesn't adhere to it. This guy makes it seem like a job. A profession.  
  
It is only a way of life to Sands. He doesn't label it as a 'job'. Because really, that would make it boring.  
  
"Sheldon. Sheldon, are you even paying attention?"  
  
Sands flinches and shakes out of his reverie. The name. His name. ".Yeah. Yeah."  
  
Sighing exaggeratedly, the man shakes his head. Fingers flex in his pocket and Sands would like to kick this man. Perhaps try out that trick he was learning and voila! Death by pencil. His patience is thinning.  
  
Those digits flex more and instead he pulls out a tattered box of Lucky Strikes. A cigarette perches on the edge of his lip, and the talking fades. Sands glances over at the shiny nameplate. 'Rush'.  
  
It seems familiar but he can't quite place it.  
  
"Not one for regulations, are you, Sheldon?" Rush asks, leaning forward in his chair. He nods his head towards the door.  
  
The 'No Smoking' sign.  
  
Sands' eyebrows shoot up, and he starts to reply, unlit cigarette bobbing up and down. "No, never have been." As an afterthought, he adds, "Sir."  
  
"No. You clearly haven't. Look at you. You're barely awake, you look like you just got out of bed, and you're already chain smoking at such a young age. That's not something to be proud of, son."  
  
He has just woken up early - on his day off, mind you-to be lectured by a man nearly three times his age, twice as cranky, and not as good looking. Sands runs a hand through his hair - short, though long enough to run his fingers through - trying to straighten it.  
  
"It seems that you don't care. And with that attitude, you never will. Now."  
  
Here it comes.  
  
"Gregory, on the other hand, he knows the regulations." Rush lets this hang in the air, having waved a hand in Gregory's direction. The man in question smiles, sits up straighter, almost smirking. Suit, slicked back hair, everything in place. Not a mark, not a scratch.  
  
Sands thinks about this for a moment, an eyebrow raised, leaning in Gregory's direction. He turns to look at Rush once more, leaning back. A pause.  
  
"I'm sorry, sir. I didn't know the CIA commended ass kissers. Thought we had to report those." Sands scrunches his nose, waving a finger in a circular motion around his face. "Blurred eyes and all. Could be dangerous for the vision."  
  
It is perfect. Gregory has a look of abject horror on his face, and Rush only smiles thinly.  
  
Sands doesn't care. He'd rather read his Catwoman.  
  
--  
  
After the meeting, the nine to five paperwork, fake apologies to the copying girl - she had a nice package, and he needed to use the machine. Decision time, it was - Sands finds himself driving up to his building. It is a two-story dump, with white stucco walls, fake plants, and dirty tiles. There are screams and bullets at night, and Sands always goes to bed with a smile on his face.  
  
Or, for the past two months, a girl on his crotch.  
  
So it isn't a bad situation, really. Here he is, fresh out of college, cranky, and already being yelled at in his job. Things are going well. Almost.  
  
Sands locks his car door, hefting a backpack and a bag. The smell of white rice, noodles, and other greasy yet tasty fuel in the afternoon. Brown paper wrapped in white plastic, a smiley face on the side. 'Have a nice day!' it says.  
  
"Sheldon! You fucking bastard!"  
  
He wonders if he could get a refund from the Chinese restaurant based solely on the bag's corny message.  
  
Sands winces, mouth opening in protest. But his jaw hangs there, his eyes widen, and he looks up at the second floor balcony.  
  
His girlfriend looks awfully happy with cutting up his comic book collection.  
  
"What the fuck-Val, VAL! What the hell are you doin'?!"  
  
"I'm 'doin'' what I should've done a long, long time ago, college boy. Leaving you," Val responds, stuffing the scraps of shiny printed paper into a dilapidated shoebox. It is full of comics she did not reach yet, though that doesn't matter really. No, it doesn't matter, as she chucks the box over the side of the balcony, papers fluttering down onto the sidewalk. Sands sticks his jaw forward before he snarls, fumbling to pick up the discarded comics.  
  
"You come home at God knows what hours in the night without an excuse, looking like shit - do you think I'm gonna stick up for this? I stuck with it for two MONTHS, like the dipshit you made me!"  
  
Sands doesn't look up, gracefully balancing the backpack on his shoulder, the bag of food, and the handfuls of Hulk, Punisher, and Jughead.  
  
"I never made you a dipshit - that just came with the package, sugarplum," Sands growls through clenched teeth, standing up straight. And the brown eyes widen again when he sees the new pile of items in her hands.  
  
His records.  
  
She throws them with the finesse of an Olympian, wild and concentrated, discus lunging and bouncing into walls, cars, and poles. There goes the Clockwork Orange soundtrack, lodged into a shrub. Bob Dylan found himself nicking a mailbox and clattering on the street. Thriller nearly missed thwacking Sands in the forehead. At least she didn't start-too late. She was breaking the records on her knee now.  
  
Sands always knew her karate classes would come in handy for something.  
  
Now she has reached his clothes. The t-shirts from Florida, the jeans from New York City, everything was thrown. A myriad of colors comes falling down, ornamenting Sands in its tacky glory.  
  
"Look at you! What a fucking loser - comic books, all this shit you collect! You fill up the place with shit and you disappear for weeks at a time! And you smell like you've been in bed with other women! At least have some sense to wash off the damn fucking lipstick!" Val shouts, fingers clenching the railing.  
  
Frankly, if she hadn't been complaining so damn loudly, he'd had her clenching the headboard instead, but apparently things were not going that smoothly.  
  
She was a pretty thing though. Dark hair, eyes, nice ass, strong chin, boobs, everything. Her eyes are wild with anger and frustration, shouting words at him in English and Spanish.  
  
At least he took classes and courses in college. Though they didn't really teach what had to inevitably be curses pouring from her mouth.  
  
"Do you think we can talk this over without having objects being - thrown at me?" Sands asks, frowning at the stray passersby. Damn nosy bastards. There they were - on the right, the next-door neighbors. Always complaining about loud noises.  
  
Sands is twenty-three, has - had, had - a girlfriend, and stays away for weeks at a time. Of course there would be noises when he comes back.  
  
"No. This isn't your apartment!"  
  
"The last time I checked the rent it was."  
  
"I live here more than you do, cabron!"  
  
"Hey! Hey." Sands holds his hands up in front of him, then points. "Foul language looks best only through me."  
  
Val shakes her head, messy makeshift ponytail sliding about her shoulders. "And so does my foot up your ass."  
  
"For one thing-" Sands pauses, looking left and right. There are stray people staring, and it is the afternoon. Not exactly a time for a shouting match, but he does it anyway. His back and neck muscles tense, reaching to pick up his things. "You're messing with the system."  
  
"What?"  
  
"System. The system!" Sands smacks Hulk #171 - now that was a story - for emphasis. "You're the steady fuck. The reliable fuck. You throw a wrench in that machine and its bye bye free world, hello tyrannical despots. It's a matter of serving those who stand up for the whole... truth. and.. justice!"  
  
That's it. Justice. The American Way. Sands was never a big fan of Superman, but you take what you can get.  
  
Val's eyebrows shoot up. "Steady? I'M the steady fu-"  
  
"Do you honestly think I'm going to put up with your crap during the non fuck mode times? Fucking. It's all we do. I'm not looking for a serious relationship because hey, not that kind of picket fence, two kids, and comical family dog type of guy. So if you'll excuse me, I think I'll be in my room pretending to lament our loss. The food and reruns are just swell at this time of night," Sands says, sarcastic but calm.  
  
Val nods, then picks up a brick from the balcony, throwing it square at Sands' forehead.  
  
This has been a really bad day. 


	2. Testing perverts, guns, and mayhem

Title: Aberrant (2/2)  
  
Author: Stef (ignitedangel@aol.com)  
  
Rating: R  
  
Summary: Sands muses on the cocky bastard that entered the CIA so many years before.  
  
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue  
  
Dedication: Thanks to Circe for motivating me to write this.  
  
Author's Note: A sequel of sorts to 'Productivity'. You really don't have to had read that in order to read this. Just going with a guess on Sands' age being 33 for dates here. Also, the drug is of my own invention, unless it exists and there's something we don't know about it. Ooh. Scary.  
  
Aberrant. Chapter II of II  
  
"That's some shiner you got there."  
  
Three more shots. Sands lowers his gun, hearing the click and whirr of the sheet come towards him. He'd been practicing his shooting - the sheet silhouette marked in the head, chest, and crotch - when this ignorant fuck has to distract him. Bad enough he started pumping him for information the day before during the meeting. They had left the office and Rush called Sands to stay behind. What did Rush say to Sands, Gregory wondered.  
  
Sands knew that if he mentioned the 'excellent work' bullshit Rush had gone on about, he'd never hear the end of Gregory's complaining. Sure, Sands had an 'attitude' - a label they stuck on him - but he was doing good work. Not entirely by the book, but just enough of an edge to show he wouldn't falter. Wouldn't break.  
  
They liked that.  
  
Sands wasn't sure if he liked that they liked that.  
  
Taking off his protective visor, Sands turns to face Gregory. He absentmindedly runs a hand through his hair, brushing past the bruise on his temple. Val, cheeky girl that she was, had a wonderful throwing arm.  
  
"Thanks for the interest. Well, no, not really," Sands says, an eyebrow rising. "We're being rebellious today, aren't we? Speaking to an agent while said agent is practicing their shooting skills. Distracting, Gregory. You could be reprimanded. You rebel, you."  
  
Gregory rolls his eyes, folding his arms across his chest. "Fuck you, Sheldon. I'm only here to give you a message."  
  
"If it involves any of your body parts, I'll have to say 'no'."  
  
"Rush wants to see you. In his office." The last words are said with a smirk. You're dead, Gregory's eyes read.  
  
"That's swell. Good work." He pats Gregory on the shoulder, heading for the adjoining room to change out of his gear. "You free tonight? Broke up with Val. Sloppy seconds and all, but she thinks you're an accountant. That's steady, buddy."  
  
--  
  
Sands isn't sure if this is a joke or that Rush has been watching Star Wars one too many times.  
  
He gets the appeal of it. Hell, had the action figures. Of course that was post-Bond, pre-deterioration into rebellion. Sands marks his life with phases. They aren't 'childhood', 'teen', 'adult'. They run by years of films, comics, and the line of girlfriends. Well, less on the latter. There's a difference between 'fucking' and 'making love'. Sands only knows of the first one, and will probably continue to adhere to it.  
  
So he pushes all the smoke and mirrors aside, and realizes he's in a plain room, sitting on a chair, with a bandana tied around his head. His wrists and ankles are bound.  
  
For a moment he wonders if Rush is actually some sort of kinky fuck, and then that dissolves.  
  
"You're used to seeing what's in front of you, Sheldon."  
  
"Sir?"  
  
"Think of this as an exercise."  
  
"I'm not sure where you're heading with this, sir." Sands turns his head this way and that, trying to see. But there is nothing other than black. There is no light filtering through the material, or up the hollows of his cheeks. There is only darkness, and Sands curses inwardly because he thinks he may or may not have to take a piss-  
  
"You're CIA. This isn't college anymore, son. You know that. You've done it for the past few months. Done a heck of a job. But you've got to learn some things. Not everything is manipulation. Not everything is solid and easy to touch. You're not untouchable, although you may think you are. So that's where the bandana comes in."  
  
"I'm going undercover as a S & M punk, now?"  
  
"Not yet. Though if you're looking for a nice night of paper work, I might be able to set that one up for you."  
  
Sands figures he'd be looking towards a nice night of fucking on the job instead of paperwork. However, apparently this sort of punk get-up isn't what he had in mind. Too bad with the punk thing. It'd be just like high school all over again.  
  
"You remember we put that on you in my office, don't you."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  
"And then we drove off to an undisclosed location."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  
"Stop that."  
  
"All right."  
  
"Back to the point. You have to find your way back to the office with the blindfold."  
  
"--What?"  
  
"It's pedestrian, I'll admit. But you'll learn from it. I know I sure as hell did. Though we didn't have the same kind of drugs we do now."  
  
Sands feels a tug on the back of his head, wisps of hair catching on the knot before slipping. The blindfold is loosened, able to fall off any minute. There are no lights. He feels himself still bound to the chair, wrists, ankles, and all. No light comes into the room, so he cannot estimate how big it is. How far the chair is from the door.  
  
"Find my way underground? What's with the blindfold? I thought you said-"  
  
"The lights are on, Sheldon. Don't worry. It'll come back to you. It only lasts for give or take six hours. You'll have plenty of time to come back by then."  
  
Now Sands is agitated. His fingers flex, and he digs inside of his suit jacket sleeve to pull the tip of a small knife strapped to his arm. Not exactly a convenient spot - he'd much prefer his leg, or that new fake arm he saw in the equipment room - but it'd do. Ten more seconds and he'd have the rope cut in a jiffy-  
  
"Failure to succeed in this mission will only earn your participation in washing my Mercedes come Monday morning."  
  
Sands lifted his head in grim realization, hearing footsteps diminish. Bonds cut from his wrists, he bends forward, quickly cutting the ropes from his ankles. Sands gets up, and then stops.  
  
The soft silk of the bandana falls past his shoulders and to the ground.  
  
Sands can't see anything. And the door closes.  
  
Drugs. Rush has blinded him.  
  
I'm blind. Okay...  
  
Sands isn't exactly sure whether he should laugh at the sheer comic book absurdity of it, or start cursing.  
  
He does both, simultaneously. He puts the knife in his pocket carefully. Then he takes three steps forward and feels his face come in contact with something very solid and cold.  
  
A column. He's walked into a column.  
  
"If I'd have known this was going on, I would've vouched for the Skywalker treatment. At least he had a helmet."  
  
Running a hand through his hair to get it out of his eyes - damn fucking drug, whatever the fucking fuck - Sands gropes the air blindly, clawing. He feels the column, smiles a little, then takes careful steps around it. Five more, and there was a wall. Left or right. Decisions, decisions.  
  
He feels a cool little breeze come up from the right, and chooses that direction. Quicker than he expected, his hand is on the doorknob, and fresh air blasts against his face. It ruffles his hair, and he waits.  
  
Cars. People. Teenagers laughing. Bicycles. The jingle and jangle of bicycles. Someone bumps walking past him, and he feels shopping bags brush past his leg. He waits longer, and he hears a car slow and the ignition turn off merely ten feet away.  
  
Not the inside of a mall. Outside. Door, small room, outside - strip mall. He was in an abandoned store or office. Where was the nearest strip mall located from the CIA building? Right. Four miles.  
  
If this was the same county, state, much less country.  
  
Sands waits, then hears the giggle and constant chatter - English, though that doesn't help much- of kids passing by. He sticks an arm out, catching one kid by the shirt.  
  
"Hey, man! Watch it!"  
  
"Where am I?"  
  
"Dude, get the--"  
  
"Cop. Tell me. Where are we?"  
  
"I ain't never seen a blind cop before."  
  
"Little fucker--"  
  
Sands feels a pain in his shin, then the scampering of sneakers. He grunts, snarls and touches his leg. Exnay on that plan. A hand snakes up past his jacket pocket, fumbles, then snatches the sunglasses. They are brand new as the last ones had broke, and so he slips these on. Much better than the unsettling blank eyes he imagines. Could be worse, the eye thing.  
  
Could be permanent.  
  
Could be in his apartment watching PBS and their musical specials. Oh, but no. No, no, shoot a couple of guards and get an Aesop slash metaphorical exercise courtesy of a certain sarcastic old bastard. Fucking A. He'd have taken the fucking lecture over this. Still, Sands knew this had to mean something. Idiotic, but something.  
  
He knew there would be a downside to the good feeling of having Gregory jealous.  
  
Rolling his eyes, Sands carefully starts walking down the block, past open store doors. He gropes along the wall, sometimes brushing past customers or outside displays. Displays - there! Something hard and long and - he has to smirk to himself - wooden. A stick. More fumbling and feeling. A cane. Just what he needed. He plucks it from its moorings, a cardboard display box, before rushing off. Glad to bump into the shoppers nearby, for he wouldn't get yelled at for stealing if they were in the way.  
  
Sands stops short, foot hovering over the edge of the sidewalk. He estimates this by sticking the cane out lower, down. Yes, the curb. It was the curb, and he nearly walked across and gotten smeared over some idiot's windshield.  
  
"Oh! You - pervert!"  
  
Another thump, different than the column. No, he knew this pain, had felt it before. Some woman was smacking him on his shoulder with her handbag. Again and again. Sands curses, screaming shouts of "fuck!" and "I'm blind, damn it!" However, the woman isn't concerned with this as she keeps smacking the crap out of him.  
  
So this would be another really, really bad day.  
  
--  
  
The Present  
  
Sands looks on the whole incident fondly. He remembers getting back to the CIA building in three hours flat. Rush's office in four, given the run around they gave him. He was lucky. He would have had to wash Rush's car if he had bumped into Gregory. Fortunately, the little ass kisser was nowhere in sight when he got back, and Sands was grateful. Gregory might've shoved and locked him into a closet.  
  
Hey, it's what Sands did the next morning once the drug wore off and his vision came back.  
  
Sure, you couldn't kill CIA officers in the building. So he had to amuse himself with G rated fun. In the building.  
  
Though he knew if he'd see that fucker laughing at him again outside of it-  
  
Sands straightens in his chair, licking his lips. He turns his head left and right, knowing he won't see anything. There are sockets there, and they are far worse than merely being drugged. Rush thought it was amusing. It wasn't at the time. Days, months after, it was. Minutely. The irony sprung from there, twisted with a hint of tequila and lime.  
  
He had walked by a pranks and parties supply store, picking up one of those prank canes that had an upturned mirror. And that woman appeared to be standing nearby, wearing a dress.  
  
He'd been made a fool that day-also pervert, but that he already knew - and Sands didn't like it. He was a cocky bastard, then and now, but still didn't like it. Much prefer to study for the test and not walk in with a broken pencil. But in the end, the lesson had been to sometimes rely on others, not walk in blind, yadda yadda, after school special, call your senator, don't do drugs and hug your parents. Well, don't hug your parents, or do. Yell at them. Whatever.  
  
Sands feels his temples throb in a headache from the moralistic garbage.  
  
He likes Rush in that respect. Rush didn't want to commend him fully. No, there was a breach of protocol. Although he liked Sands for the excitement he displayed, he needed to know that wasn't how one went about these sort of things. One needed boundaries and rules. One needed to learn to rely on others for certain things, other times not. And do it by the book.  
  
Once again: whatever.  
  
Falling from his seat, his body slips down to the floor. Shirt twisted, and he finally pulls it off, feeling the scratchy touch of rug beneath bare skin. His fingers grope about blindly for the sunglasses, but they are gone. Instead he turns to lie on his back, kicking the shirt away. The window remains open, and curtains flutter in the breeze. He knows this for they brush the skin of his chest, back and forth, constant movement.  
  
He runs a hand along his forehead and pushes his hair away from his eyes. Fingers are careful not to brush past his eyebrows, and the sockets there. Sheldon Sands can be a kinky S & M punk. Or a perverted, comic book reading fuck. But deep down, he doesn't want to feel. His sockets, or anywhere. Never his eyes. He's not ready for it, nor does he think he will be. Ever. Because right now, he can try to muse about the past. He can try to imagine how Gregory looked like hours ago, the colors of lights outside his window. Yet the mental images don't fully focus.  
  
He can only picture Gregory at twenty three, and not older. The scene smokes to an office around them. And he is there, sitting with Gregory, wearing a plain black suit, white shirt and black tie. He has his eyes still, and stray bangs bother them, ones that he has to constantly push back. Sands is young and rebellious, sarcastic, dark, mellow. Gregory would complain, and Sands would slip his hand into his pants. Then it'd go in two directions: the lewd one, and the near shitting of the other officer, since Sands liked to keep his gun in his pants. Damn weak nerves Gregory had. Whiny fuck.  
  
But he's dead now, and Sands is blind, older, hair longer, and tanned.  
  
So after he thinks about all this, he stumbles to his feet and bends low. A sweep of his hand and his sunglasses find a way back. Then they go on his face, his shirt and jacket on his person, and he is off.  
  
It is late, but Sands figures he can try to check out a bar, and see how good the pork is. And then tomorrow, perhaps the museum of sex on Fifth Avenue, after picking up the latest Catwoman.  
  
Because even if he was a cocky young bastard out of college, an older psychotic, pork craving fuck now, he still has his priorities.  
  
After all, he has to live up to the pervert mantel that woman bestowed upon him so many years ago.  
  
END 


End file.
